Fondness, perhaps, or worry about the dumbing down of the population, or objection to mindless hype?

A device limited to a tiny screen, one app open at a time, and pathetic I/O that takes up much of the already-tiny screen, clearly aren't PCs. When I see headlines that claim that these little guys are creating a "post-PC era," it leaves me incredulous.

When we used pen and paper, we were not limited to a small area that only showed a few lines of text, while writing. How can anyone write anything meaningful with such a restriction? And the physical desktop did not limit us to just one sheet of paper or to just one open book at a time. So unless we're back to using paper and physical books, I find it non-credible that the lesser tablets that created such a stir could usher in any "post-PC" anything. Arguments that "most people" supposedly don't need a PC also sound non-credible, unless these people are back to using books and pads of paper to get their work done (including schoolwork, btw).

So here we are, with evidence that just maybe we're not quite in a "post-PC era," just maybe the PC and the tablet or smartphone fill different roles, but we go on pretending.

The tablets that created the hype, it seems to me, didn't come close to deserving said hype. However, it's most likely the case that the multiuse PC will evolve into something a lot more portable, but without mandating the compromised usefulness of the lesser tablets of today.

Higher bandwidth connectivity will change the landscape for good. Thinner clients with standard and ubiquitous accessories will become the norm. They will be handheld devices, the word PC will become defunct :-)

What I am seeing is PC makers doing more innovating than they have in a long time. Desktop PCs and laptops had become, quite frankly, boring. There is nothing like a sharp drop in sales to force companies into trying new things. Most of these will end up unsuccessful, but there is a possibility that they will come up with true differentiators that will give PCs in some form a new lease on life.

Actually, though, Apple still continues to be "most profitable." In other words, to charge more.

It should not be surprising that a company that charges more will lose market share, as the masses start buying up the new devices. Apple will have to invent some other new toy, a la smartphone, at precisely the right time (i.e. when the infrastructure is ready for the device). Then for another period of time, they will get the market share from early adopters. And the cycle repeats.